A Light in the Darkness
by Mikauzoran
Summary: Aoko's finally given up on him, and Kaito is devastated. As he tries to keep it together, he finds an unexpected confidant in Shinichi who's fighting a similar battle. They become tentative acquaintances, allies along with the FBI in the fight against the Organization, close friends, and then, maybe, in the end, something more.
1. Flicker

Mikau: Hello and welcome everyone! Thanks so much for checking this out. This is actually a sister fic to Falling in Love Literally (HakuSera), but they both stand on their own yet complement each other, so you don't have to read FLL to understand what's going on here. This is eventually going to be KaiShin, but it's a slow progression, starting from them just meeting. So all of my FLL people who aren't KaiShin fans will probably enjoy the Kaito and Conan friendship the first couple chapters, and then you can just drop out as soon as it gets too shippy for you. Sound fair? Excellent. Anyway, I'm really excited about this, showing Kaito and Shinichi becoming friends and teaming up, hopefully some of Kaito working with the FBI, and, of course, Kaito plotting to get Hakuba and Sera together. Those are my plans anyway. Now I'll just shut up and let you read. Thanks in advance!

Disclaimer: If I owned it, the audience would be filled in on more of the details. I think it's really fun when the audience knows some big secret that the characters don't. It's exciting to wonder when they'll figure it out or to watch a scene unfolding and scream "He's your brother! Tell her that you're her brother!" But Aoyama-sensei seems to like to keep the readers in the dark. Most of the time we don't know as much as the characters do.

…

Chapter One: Flickering

The door closed, and the smile melted off of Kaito's face like the clocks of Dali's Persistence of Memory.

He didn't even bother stretching out his arm to fumble for the lights as he trudged through the cold, lonely house and upstairs to his bedroom. Six steps to the stairwell and then thirteen up it. Ten more down the hall for a total of twenty-nine steps too many for the exhausted teen.

He dragged his feet like the walking dead over to his bed and collapsed.

The old springs creaked and groaned under his weight as if he were as heavy as his current mood.

Kaito didn't have the energy to change into his pajamas or even pull down the covers to properly climb into bed, so he buried his face in the pillow and just lay there as still as a corpse until he had no choice but to move his head slightly to breathe. As he gasped for air like an asthmatic, the hot, briny tears finally broke through the surface and began to trickle down his face.

After two and a half years, Aoko was finally starting to give up on him.

They'd been eating lunch up on the roof earlier that day, and she was strangely quiet.

Kaito had tried all of his usual ploys in order to get her to smile, but…

It was like Aoko was mentally off traveling the universe. She didn't seem to hear him or see what he was doing. But then she thoughtfully pressed a piece of sushi to her lips, took a bite, chewed deliberately, swallowed, and said in a distant voice, "Kaito hasn't been around lately."

The magician froze, onigiri halfway to his mouth. He frowned slightly, bit his lip, and replied, "Yeah. Sorry about that, but…you know with my job, it's a little…"

"The job that you can't tell Aoko anything about," she mumbled, gazing down rather blankly into her bentou.

"Y-Yeah." Kaito swallowed hard, wishing he had a better excuse.

Over the years, his work as Kid had become more and more time consuming as he refined his art. There was an incredible amount of research to do about the jewels themselves, and he also had to keep up on the latest thieving techniques. Then there were the blueprints of the local museums as well as their security features which were constantly being upgraded.

All of those tasks demanded his attention on top of looking into possible Pandora candidates. There was recon to do, inventions to test out and reconfigure. It took time to concoct those clever riddles of his. _And _he had to come up with baffling new tricks to stay one step ahead of the Taskforce and Tantei-kun.

Things had eased up a little since Hakuba found out about Snake and Pandora, but the Taskforce had some young new recruits that could keep up with Kid a little better than the original squad. Kaito had to be mentally _and _physically sharp in order to stay out of jail and save the world. This necessitated an hour or two of physical conditioning daily.

When you threw in getting ready for university in the spring and doing enough of his homework not to flunk senior year, Kaito just didn't have time for shopping with the girls or accompanying Aoko on her trips to the grocery store or even just coming over to watch a movie and eat dinner together.

And it sucked.

Kaito wanted nothing more than to spend time with the girl he liked, even though he knew nothing could happen between them until after Kid was a thing of the past. He couldn't put her in danger, couldn't tell her how he felt about her with the same mouth that taunted her father at heists.

There was a thick wall of bulletproof glass between them that Kaito couldn't get through. He couldn't break it down or climb over it. All he could do was stare through it at her slightly distorted form and listen to her muffled voice and curse himself for letting The One get away all because of his stupid vigilante crusade.

"I really am sorry, Aoko. This is just something that I have to do," he replied in that gentle, serious, apologetic tone that he rarely used with her (but that she deserved to hear more often). "…I'm guessing that I missed something important?"

Aoko shook her head slowly, still not looking at him. "Not really." She shrugged, popping an octopus-shaped wiener into her mouth. "Kaito hasn't been around much, but…Yamada-kun has been hanging out with Aoko."

Kaito stilled, his body tensing.

"Aoko and Yamada-kun have been hanging out the past month, and it's been really fun," she continued but then paused as if she were waiting for him to say something.

He felt as if there were some magic words he was supposed to read or scripted lines that she was waiting for him to recite. All Kaito could come up with was, "That's good, Aoko. I'm glad you haven't been lonely without me around. I'm…I'm glad you're having fun."

It was a lie, like two-thirds of everything that came out of his mouth nowadays. He didn't want her with another guy. If he wasn't hamstringed by the whole Kid problem, he would have gone right up to Yamada and pranked the hell out of the weasel.

But Aoko _was_ lonely, and Kaito couldn't be there for her. He was failing his duties, and someone else was picking up the slack. It made him want to quit so bad. He wanted to say screw it to his alter ego and Pandora, the Organization, Snake and his goons, his father—all of it. He wished he could just be Kaito for her again with no other responsibilities or obligations than to spoil her rotten and treat her like the precious woman she was to him.

Aoko frowned ever so slightly at his answer. Those hadn't been the words she'd been waiting for.

She took a long sip of her yuzu juice to stall before dropping the bomb on him: "Yamada-kun asked Aoko out."

Kaito's mouth dropped open, and his eyes widened. His ears started ringing. He felt lightheaded. And cold. Strangely cold for this early in fall.

"…And what did you say?" Kaito asked in a very tiny, hollow voice.

This was only a bad dream. Or she was messing with him. This wasn't happening.

"Aoko said that she needed to think about it." For the first time in the entire conversation she looked up at him, and her clear, captivating, peacock blue eyes cut through him.

It felt like one of his lungs had been punctured as Aoko looked at him and continued, "What does Kaito think?"

Kaito's gut instinct was to give up his night job, his father's mission and tell her that she didn't need Yamada because Kaito was the one that was going to make her happy and grow old with her. But he knew he couldn't turn his back on an Organization so willing and eager to kill. Kaito had a job to do, and his own happiness had to be put on the backburner when pitted against the safety of others.

So Kaito stapled on an artificial smile (the kind she'd long since stopped seeing through) and replied, "Just…does he treat you right? …Make you happy?"

She nodded, shocked at his words. It didn't take a psychic to see she was disappointed, that she had wanted him to jump in and get possessive and over-protective, to claim her as his own.

"Then that's good," Kaito replied halfheartedly.

Aoko only heard the words, not the tone, she was hit so hard by his seeming lack of reaction. Didn't he care for her?

The truth was that he cared too much. He loved her enough to let her go.

"Then maybe Aoko will go out with Yamada-kun." She gave him one last chance.

"Yeah," Kaito whispered with a nod, stuffing the entire onigiri in his mouth before he could lose his nerve and take it all back.

…

Kaito went to the nurse's office after lunch so that he could lie down and sleep off the nightmare his life was fast becoming.

Aoko and Hakuba came after school to escort him home, and he'd kept up a false, cheery front that hadn't quite fooled the detective; however, soon enough they were at the Kuroba abode, and Kaito could let the façade drop as the front door clicked shut behind him.

He'd have to talk to Hakuba about it later, but, for now at least, Kaito was content to smother himself with his pillow and cry about how unfair his life was.

And he did cry for a while…until he got sick of feeling weak and helpless. He decided that rather than feel sorry for himself, getting mad was a better use of time. So the poor pillow took a pounding as he beat it with his fists and slammed it against the ground. It didn't make him feel any better, though. He only felt out of control and childish.

And alone.

The house was empty. There was no one to talk things through with, no one to give advice and comfort. Kaito was on his own, and suddenly it seemed overwhelming.

His eyes fell upon the portrait of his father. He couldn't make out the individual lines of the photo, but he had long since memorized them, could recall the details eyes closed.

"This is all your fault," he whispered, voice shaking. "What the hell were you thinking going off on a suicide mission with a family at home? When you had a little kid that absolutely worshiped you waiting for you to come back? Did you really not care? Did you not think about me even once before putting yourself in danger like that?"

In the back of his mind, he knew the answer: Kuroba Touichi had done it all for Kaito's sake, to make a better world for Kaito. Because Touichi adored Kaito more than anything. Touichi had loved his wife and his son enough to die trying to create something better for them.

But Kaito didn't want to be understanding at the moment. He was in pain, desperately needing someone besides himself to blame right now, and the dead rarely defended themselves, making his father a suitable target.

"This is your fault!" he shouted. "You left me! And then Mom ran off too because she couldn't deal with the fact that you were gone! It's your fault that I have to lie to Aoko! It's your fault that I can't…!" His voice broke. His body was trembling. "That I'm not normal," he whispered, tears streaming down his face once more.

"I'm sorry, Dad," he choked, feeling guilty for his misplaced rage as happy memories of his loving, doting father nudged at him.

Kuroba Touichi had been an imperfect man, but a good man nonetheless. He'd loved his family, worked hard, and, like Kaito, had taken every opportunity to make others smile. In his own way, he'd been trying to do the right thing.

It was Kaito's decision to become Kid. He could have walked away, but he'd chosen this. Sure, he'd grossly underestimated the consequences of his actions, but the choice had been his. The blame fell squarely on Kaito's shoulders alone.

As he admitted those facts to himself, Kaito wanted nothing more than to have his father there to hold him. It had always been Touichi to come in and hold him when he'd had a bad dream. His father had always stayed up with him when he was sick. When Kaito was sad or hurt, Touichi let Kaito rest his head in his lap and massaged his scalp until the tears went away.

How Kaito needed that now, someone to hold him through the pain when he felt like he was disintegrating. He wanted someone to tell him it was okay, tell him how to fix everything. Because Kaito was feeling so lost, and there was no one to talk to, no one he could be _that_ vulnerable with.

He had Jii-chan and Hakuba, but…though he could vent his frustrations to them, they weren't people that he could ask to hold him while he cried.

Instead of stewing in his own snot and tears, Kaito decided to be proactive. He forced himself up off the bed and dragged himself over to the closet to change, putting on his reconnaissance black. He climbed out his bedroom window and took a deep breath of the early night air as the last light of day faded below the horizon and astronomical twilight set in. It would be perfectly dark by the time he got where he was going.

There were a couple skyscrapers that just begged to be jumped off of, and Kaito was in the mood to take them up on the challenge.

It was truly freeing to fall through the air—see the ground coming up at you, the lights from the street below—and then spread your wings and defy gravity. Kaito loved the rush of wind battering his body, caressing his face.

It helped to mask the sounds of his own screams of frustration as he fell. He couldn't hear himself crying over the air whistling in his ears.

And after repeating the process of running towards the edge, diving, yelling like a man possessed, opening his wings, and flying about a dozen times, Kaito was beginning to feel better. At least a bit.

Having regained his composure but still sorely hurting, Kaito began making his way back to Ekoda. On his way to the station, he passed Beika Park and spotted the lone figure of a young boy kicking a soccer ball as hard as he possibly could, crying out in pain and frustration with every kick. And there was no mistaking the very distinctive cowlick riding atop the boy's head.

Kaito paused in the shadows just outside the beam of the streetlamp. He pursed his lips in thought, really considering what he was about to do before deciding to heck with it. Kaito used the basic tools he had on him to make a simple female disguise that still looked a great deal like Kaito in the end. As he approached his rival, Kaito prayed that the darkness would conceal his features from the sharp eyes of the sleuth.

"Are you alright, little boy?" he called softly as he drew closer. "Why are you all alone out here this late?"

Conan jumped at the sudden interruption to his own private meltdown and, in response, spun around, hand already reaching for that detestable tranquilizer watch.

But then Conan caught sight of the young woman that Kaito appeared to be, and his guard lowered. He started to mentally prepare a story, an excuse as to why exactly a child such as himself was alone at the park at night.

Kaito could see the gears turning in Conan's head as that brilliant brain spun a clever lie. Their minds worked in much the same way, even though Kaito was sure that Shinichi would be loathed to admit it.

It was then Kaito realized how sad it was. When he saw Conan's own version of poker face slam down to cover up all of the suffering with that obnoxious, childish façade, Kaito wondered if he himself looked anything like that. It was truly a depressing, unhealthy thing, forcing down and smothering your emotions, hiding it from everyone and pretending that you were fine.

Kaito knew what that felt like…how lonely that was.

Kaito frowned as the detective opened his mouth to offer some excuse in that sickly sweet voice that was supposed to make Conan sounds like an actual eight year-old.

Kaito didn't have the energy to play pretend today, so he cut Conan off before his little natural predator could spew concocted cover stories and crafted lines. "It's okay, Tantei-kun. It's just me. You can save it, but, tell me: Did the wall do something to you, or was it the ball you were trying to punish?"

The mask fell clean off of Conan's face as he realized with whom he was speaking. "Kid," he growled, baring his teeth slightly like a dog defending his turf.

"Easy. I come in peace," Kaito assured, holding up his hands in an appeasing gesture.

"What do _you_ want?" Conan hissed, channeling the spirit of a vengeful rattlesnake.

"Always so suspicious," Kaito sighed, strolling over to a nearby bench and taking a seat. "I was just passing by and thought I'd say hello."

"I'm in a bad mood right now, so get the hell out of here before I pummel you and call the cops," the boy threatened.

Kaito frowned. "Did you ever stop to think that maybe I've had a bad day too? Maybe _I'm_ the one in a bad mood."

"Yeah right, Clown," Conan scoffed, returning to the soccer ball's (or was it the wall's?) punishment. "Go rob a museum or something. Steal the entire building, and then give it back," he laughed bitterly, sending the ball flying with a good kick. "That's what you do, right? That's how you have fun?"

Suddenly Kaito saw red, and he couldn't take it anymore. Flying to his feet, he shouted, "How dare you?! How dare you mock me like that when I only stopped to see if you were okay?! You have no idea what I'm going through! What I'm fighting for! And yet you stand there and judge me?! You think I would give up everything for some stupid adrenaline rush?! I have a mission! You think I would sacrifice my chances of ever being with the girl I love for kicks?! You don't know the first thing about me, so don't start talking shit, Kudo!" Kaito spat, breath ragged and body shaking in rage as angry tears started streaming down his cheeks.

Meanwhile, Conan stood stock still, staring at his rival in shock even as the soccer ball bounced back and rolled right past him.

"…Sorry," Conan whispered. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean… Sorry, Kid."

Kaito wiped away the hot tears for a second time that day and retook his seat, slowly pulling himself back together. "…I'll let it go this once, but only because you look like hell yourself."

Conan took a hesitant step closer. "What happened? If you don't mind me asking?"

Kaito laughed, almost replying, "My dad died, my mom left, and I'm incapable of having health, normal relationships." Instead he returned the question with one of his own, "Do you really want to know? Do you actually want to understand me?"

"Do you want me to understand you?" Conan replied.

Kaito thought about it for a moment before deciding, "I want _someone_ to understand me. It might as well be you."

"Then I'll listen," Conan offered, inching a little closer, afraid to make a wrong move.

Kaito beckoned him nearer. "I'll tell you a story. There once was a king." Kaito made a fist, and when he opened his hand, the king of clubs was there. "And a queen." With a flick of his wrist, the queen of clubs joined her husband. "They were good and kind…with sort of strange senses of humor, but they were compassionate and fun-loving. They had a son." Kaito slid the two cards together, and when he pulled them apart, the eight of clubs had joined the hand. "And everyone was very happy…"

Kaito set his little card family down on the bench beside him and then reached out to draw the ace of spades from behind Conan's ear. He showed his audience the card. "…until the king was murdered." He placed the king and the ace into his pocket. Next he picked up the queen and showed it to Conan. "The queen went mad with grief and disappeared…" And so did the card. It had been there in Kaito's hand one second and then gone the next as the magician made an elaborate dissipating gesture. "…leaving the boy alone."

Kaito turned the eight of clubs face down, wearing a heartbreakingly forlorn expression.

Conan gulped. "What happened to the boy?" he prompted, getting wrapped up in the tale.

"He grew up." Kaito shrugged as he flipped the card back over, revealing the jack of clubs. "And he found out his father's secret." Kaito took the king of clubs back out of his pocket and showed it to Conan once more. He spun the card on his finger tip, and when it came to a stop, it was no longer the king but the joker. "The boy's father had a secret identity. So, hoping to bring the murderers to justice, the boy disguised as his father and continued his father's mission." Kaito spun the jack as well, and it too became a joker.

"Only…" Kaito smiled sadly, chuckling at his own predicament. "The boy kind of sucks at it. He's not as smart, strong, fast, or clever as his father. There have been times when he's screwed up and only gotten by on sheer luck. The boy's a mess, and he's grabbing at straws. He has no idea what he's doing, and in the past two and a half years has made discouragingly little actual progress in the search. And…"

Kaito waved his hand, and the ace of hearts appeared. A look of absolute misery took over Kaito's face, and he let the emotion show. "There's this girl. A princess…someone he's wanted to marry since he was five. Only she's hates the joker. She…she did have feelings for the boy…at least _before_ she did. She's just been waiting for so long…but he can't be with her so long as he's the joker, but…she's tired of waiting."

Kaito closed his eyes, putting the cards away. He continued in a very small, strangled voice. "And today she told me she's found someone else. And I let her go because…because I'm stupid and I've got this dumb job to do. I don't want to let my dad down. I don't want…I don't want his death to be in vain, and I want to get those bastards that ruined my family…my life. I want to shut them down so there won't be any more kids like me."

Conan said nothing for a moment, taking it all in before responding gently, "You know, if it helps, I can kind of understand what that's like."

"I thought you might," Kaito chuckled sadly. "Wanna talk about it? I've got time."

Conan heaved a cinderblock-sized sigh before beginning, "…Ran is…it's been almost three years. I can't ask her to wait any longer. She wants to have a normal life with a guy that's actually around, so…I've slowly been pulling away. Consequently…I don't know…. I just feel like…I can't describe it. It's—"

"—Like you're losing yourself to the lie?" Kaito offered. "Like even though there are all these people around, you're completely isolated 'cause no one gets it. And it's not just that you're an angsty teen, literally _no one_ gets it. That's how I feel, anyway."

"…Yeah," Conan whispered breathlessly, staring wide-eyed at his rival. "How did you…? I…"

Kaito shrugged, casting the detective a weak smile. "You see, we're more alike than you thought."

Shinichi's mind was flying in a dozen different directions, still trying to comprehend everything that Kid had said. Was it really possible that someone out there knew what Shinichi was going through, how he felt? Did Kid actually _get_ him when no one else could?

The gears slammed to a halt on one big issue, "…but you're a thief."

Kaito met Conan's gaze and replied, "And a human being."

Looking away, Conan reconsidered. "I suppose you have your reasons."

"I do."

Frowning, Conan looked back up. "Would you tell me? What you're looking for? What mission your father left you?"

"Not tonight," Kaito answered quietly, getting up and preparing to leave. "It was nice chatting with you, Meitantei. Ciao~."

"Wait!" Conan jumped to his feet, propelled by the feeling that if he let Kid go now, he'd never have another chance to speak with him like this. Something deep within him told him that he needed to talk to someone who could relate, that he would soon go mad with no one around that could comprehend his suffering and empathize.

Kaito gave a half turn, looking back over his shoulder at the shrunken teen. He raised an eyebrow.

Conan bit his lip, not sure how to begin, how to express what he needed to say. "…Don't go yet…please," was what came out.

Kaito completed his turn and tilted his head to the side, returning Conan's stare and waiting to see what his detective would do.

"Look," Conan sighed. "You're miserable, I'm depressed, so…why don't we…?" He sighed once more, hands rifling through his hair in frustration at the right words that just wouldn't come out.

Kaito allowed himself one manically impish grin. He'd earned it after all of the heartache today. "Tantei-kun, are you asking me on a date?"

"NO!" Conan sputtered, shaking his head and waving his arms so vehemently that Kaito had to laugh despite himself and the hole in his heart. "I just…mean…coffee! Do you drink coffee? Or eat food or something? People…people meet for coffee sometimes."

"I may be a phantom, but I'm not a ghost," Kaito snickered, feeling much more like himself than he had since lunch. "I eat food like a normal person, Tantei-kun."

"I doubt you do anything like a normal person," Conan snorted.

"You have a point," Kaito admitted with a wide, mischievous smirk. "Well, if you wish to keep my company a little bit longer tonight, we could always go for curry and Haagen-Dazs in Shibuya."

Conan's jaw dropped. "That doesn't sound like an appetizing combination."

"Says you," Kaito pouted. "That's _quality _comfort food."

Shaking his head, the detective caved. "Whatever. Lead the way."

Kaito complied.

They walked in silence to Shibuya, each wondering how they had found themselves in the other's company.

"This is surreal," Kaito mumbled as they took a shortcut down a little alleyway. "Did you ever imagine you'd be spending time with _me_?"

"…I had a dream about it once," Conan admitted.

"You dream about me?" Kaito snickered.

"I have nightmares about you," Conan grumbled, stuffing his hands in his pockets.

"Mean," Kaito retorted, clicking his tongue.

There was a pregnant pause before Kaito continued in a somber tone, "Thanks for putting away your detective badge long enough to hang out, though. I've seriously had the worst day, and the last thing I need is to go home to that empty house and stew."

"…I need this too," Conan confessed. "So thanks for trusting me enough to come."

Kaito shrugged as they came out of the alley right in front of the Indian restaurant.

"You've _earned_ it," he chuckled, opening the door before the topic could be further discussed.

…

Mikau: So what do you think so far? I'm planning on starting them off as friends and then showing how the relationship grows and changes over the months, eventually ending with them ending up together. It's going to be slow and gradual, but I'm looking forward to developing the relationship from rivals to acquaintances to friends to a couple. It'll be fun to show their relationship in different lights.

On a separate note, I believe at this point I'll be using this first chapter as my submission for the Poirot Café forum's fourth writing competition. Unless I can bust out that HakuSera "suspicion" fic I was planning. I've sudden become very busy, so that might not happen. Anyway, I wanted to thank everyone that's voted for me in the past. I got first for my first entry and took second for my second one. Does that mean next time I'll get third place? Hmm. But thank you so much for supporting me. It makes me so happy that you all enjoy my writing. Well, hopefully you enjoyed chapter one and will be joining me next time! Thanks so much for giving this a try, and have an awesome day everyone!


	2. Glow

Mikau: Hello guys! I finally got chapter two done! Sorry for the slow going. I've been busy with work and my personal life as of late. Anyway, I've also got the new FLL chapter up, just like every Friday, and I've also got a new one-shot as well. It's called Breaking Point. It's an angsty introspective Conan piece that I'm rather proud of based on Natsumi (Detectivewriters)'s pic "Depressed Conan" in the Fanart section on Poirot Café. Anyway, I think you'll like it, so check out the pic and the fic. ^.^ Thanks so much for all of the reviews last chapter! Thanks to: Kimmiko T, Ern Estine 13624, kakashikrazy256, djgurza.15, Bunnyz-chan, Orange04, GeekyGenius, Miss Emotion, Kitty Katrona, Assasin8, and Guest (Sorry, no. Probably not a whole lot of Haibara. I think she appears most in CTM, but I don't have a whole lot of use for her on a regular basis. Sorry.)!

Disclaimer: If I owned it, there would be more angst. There's not enough of it for all of the drama and depressing stuff in the show. Everyone, stop being so resilient! Break down! Cry! Come on.

…

Chapter Two: Glow

"Why didn't you get any meat?" Conan finally asked after five minutes of sneaking curious glances at the Kaitou Kid's curry. "The vegetable curry isn't any cheaper than getting meat or seafood, so…"

Kaito looked up at his rival and blinked once, moving the long, auburn bang of his disguise out of his (colored contact) parakeet green eyes. "I don't eat meat."

Now it was Conan's turn to blink. "O-Oh." He swallowed hard, looking down into his bowl of curry udon as if it would provide him with something to say in return. He looked back up just as Kaito was taking a dainty sip of his milkshake.

"Why?" the shrunken sleuth inquired much like the small child he appeared to be.

Kaito shrugged, setting down his tall, glass cup with a decisive chink. "You and I are like-minded creatures. We both detest violence and think that murder is deplorable, right?"

Conan found himself nodding in agreement, all the while musing, _"Who would have ever thought that two people so fundamentally different would ever come to agree upon anything?"_

"Well, my definition of murder just happens to be a little broader than yours," Kaito answered simply.

"You're not one of those crazy PETA people, are you?" Conan fixed his companion with a stare of pure suspicious for a second time that evening.

Kaito shook his head and took another bite of eggplant. "Not quite _that_ crazy. Those people are…their hearts are in the right place, but…" Kaito grimaced, not wanting to be associated with the individuals in question. "Anyway, maybe if you knew where your food has been…what the animals have been through, how they lived, how they died, the inhumanity of it all, and just how gruesome it truly is…maybe then you'd see why I have a problem with consuming my fellow earthlings."

Conan couldn't help but look down into his bowl and really wonder for the first time.

"You might as well eat it now, though," Kaito chimed in. "You've already paid for it, thus supporting the cycle. It'd be a shame to let its death be in vain. You might as well let poor Bessie nourish your body…. Just think for a minute before you order next time."

Conan frowned deeply as he had a staring contest with the contents of his bowl, for now he couldn't help but feel that his dinner was staring back at him. "'Bessie'?" he repeated incredulously, looking back up and raising an eyebrow at the thief.

Kaito nodded. "Yeah. When I was little, my dad had a friend with a farm, and I was best friends with all the animals there. So now whenever I see a hamburger, I can't help but think of Bessie the cow. With things like tonkatsu, it's always Hubert the pig, and all the yakitori in the world is Camilla the chicken."

Conan nodded very slowly. "O…kay." It ended up sounding like a question with the slight upward inflection at the end.

"You think I'm positively batty," Kaito chuckled, managing to feel a tiny bit better about the whole Aoko situation while he was out with his favorite critic, making the shrunken detective several different levels of uncomfortable.

"Yes." Conan didn't even bother denying it. "Certifiable, but…" How to say it? I think it's really cute how your little animal friends meant so much to you? No. Let's not get too touchy feely, despite kind of baring your heart to the guy about Ran earlier at the park. "I can respect your feelings on the matter."

"…Thanks," Kaito responded with a small smile.

"So…does it bother you, me eating this?" Conan indicated his curry udon, biting his lip nervously.

Kaito shook his head, picking his milkshake back up and taking a long draw from the straw. "Yes and no. I've come to accept that this is the world I live in, and we can't all go out and hunt our food, using all the parts that we possibly can. I'm grown up enough to realize that mass-produced meat is a necessary evil of the society I'm a part of. I wish the whole process could be less cruel, but…so long as the business world operates the way it does and people are motivated by the bottom line, poor innocent chicks are going to be crammed into small spaces together and have their beaks ripped off so they can't maim each other before they're eventually turned into chicken nuggets at McDonald's."

Kaito sighed and continued, "I try not to let it bother me. People like chicken nuggets. They like chicken nuggets so much, and they like them cheap, so they turn a blind eye to the plight of the chickens. I don't have to like it, but it's something I have to accept because it's not something I can change. So you can go ahead and enjoy your curry udon. It doesn't bother me."

Suddenly Conan was feeling like the scum of society. He looked down at Bessie in his bowl once more and felt the sharp pains of guilt stabbing at him like jagged glass shards. "I think…maybe I'll order something else next time," he decided.

"Next time?" Kaito inquired as if he had never heard the words before and was thus wondering at their meaning.

Conan blinked. "Yeah. The next time that you and I…" He trailed off as he realized what Kid had been getting at.

"Is there going to be a second date? 'Cause I would have thought that I'd scared you off with my PETA-esque rant," Kaito chuckled.

Conan turned cherry tomato red and glared. "Idiot. It's not a date, and I—"

"—I know. Sorry." Kaito continued to laugh, mischief sparkling in his eyes for the first time since Aoko had sprung the news of her and Yamada's impending courtship on him. "I guess I must be a closet sadist because I just really love that face that you make when I tease you like that. You know. The one where you look like you're struggling to breathe?"

Conan's glare intensified until it was sharp enough to slice and dice as well as one of those fancy, infomercial blenders. "It's okay. I understand. I mean, I'd _love_ to see you make that face too…as I wrap my tiny hands around your neck and choke you out. Then we'll see how many funny quips you've got up your sleeve while you're unconscious."

"What were we saying before about both loathing violence?" Kaito reminded, smiling a tad nervously. "And wouldn't it be easier to just sleep dart me?"

"Strangling you would be more satisfying," Conan replied coldly.

Kaito was beginning to sweat. His dining companion sounded serious. The chibified sleuth was even beginning to look a little on the vicious side. (Reminiscent of a rabid chipmunk, if you asked Kaito.) That thought was an equal mix of comical and terrifying.

Time to defuse the situation.

"May I recommend learning to push my buttons instead?" the magician offered. "Getting inside someone's head and f-ing them up is far more satisfying than physically wrecking them, in my experience."

"Pushing your buttons is not something I ever want to do again." Conan grimaced, hanging his head with a sigh as he thought back to that one unfortunate time on top of the blimp.

Kaito blinked, slowly tilting his head to the side. "Am I missing something?"

"No. No. I just was remembering something very unpleasant," the detective explained with a pained look on his face, wishing he had a bucket of brain bleach.

Kaito shrugged off his rival's evasive behavior, accepting that he might never know what the detective was thinking…at that particular moment, anyway. "I guess you kind of already know how to push my buttons, though," Kaito mused. "You manage to annoy the ever living daylights out of me on a regular basis, and you never fail to get in my way and screw things up at heists. Hn. You're pretty good at getting inside my head after all."

"That's a gross thought." Conan shuddered, trying to come up with a new topic of conversation.

"What? You being inside me?" Kaito smiled innocently.

Conan resisted the urge to punch the guy and then throw up. Or maybe throw up and then punch the guy? He wasn't quite sure on the order yet.

"You live by yourself, right?" Conan enacted his genius change of topic.

Kaito blinked and then looked at his acquaintance, a completely scandalized expression in place. "Tantei-kun, I'm not taking you back to my place after a first date! Just what kind of slut do you think I am?!"

Conan's mouth dropped open. His cheeks turned phoenix red as steam started coming out of his ears.

Kaito smiled sweetly.

Muttering under his breath about stupid, perverted thieves, Conan took a long sip of his iced coffee.

Once he'd set the glass down once more, Conan tried again. "I mean, you've lived alone for a while, right? You said that your mom disappeared after your dad died, right? So…did you live with relatives or…?"

The mischievous grin faded from Kaito's face. "She didn't disappear. She…" Kaito looked away, turning his gaze out the window. "…got sick. She had to stay at the hospital for, like, a year, and then…she just couldn't take care of me anymore. So she left me. Ten years later, she's still off traveling the world. I think she's…" He shook his head. "I think she's looking for something. Maybe it's a new life, excitement, distractions, revenge…I don't know. I think she's doing what I'm doing—just trying to be okay or at least convince herself that she's okay. She comes back from time to time, but…she never stays. I live at our house, and some of our neighbors check in on me. More so when I was little, but…I live alone."

Conan was quiet for a minute, a thoughtful look on his face, like he was searching for the right words to form his response. He looked uncomfortable.

"What's the matter?" Kaito chuckled wryly. "Too much sharing for your liking, Tantei-kun? I thought we were being honest with each other today and today only, kind of like a one day sale," Kaito taunted, trying to cover up his insecurity, his fear of being rejected.

Somehow the thought of even just his rival at work backing away from him, saying "Your baggage is too much for me to handle. Keep it to yourself." was terrifying to Kaito.

"No," Conan finally replied after careful consideration. "Sorry. I'm just…I'm used to you being all cryptic and elusive and, frankly, annoying. I'm just a little thrown by you being…I don't know…. Human. Vulnerable. Basically anything other than a target for soccer balls and tranq darts, really."

"Hey," Kaito interjected, but Conan kept going.

"It's bizarre…but sort of nice to get a look at the actual person behind that monocle," he concluded.

"Oh," Kaito replied weakly, his voice rising at the end a little bit like a question. "So…it doesn't weird you out or, I don't know, scare you off, me talking about my parents like that?" Kaito held his breath and prayed to whatever gods might be listening.

"No," Conan returned quickly with a shrug. "It's refreshing to finally get some honest answers out of you for a change. It gives me some more pieces to work with."

"'Pieces'?" Kaito repeated, blinking in confusion.

Conan shifted uncomfortably, but he looked the thief in the eye as he admitted, "Yeah. Like a jigsaw. You're actually one of my favorites. Puzzle. One of my favorite puzzles, I mean."

A chill ran down Kaito's spine as those artic blue eyes looked into his own, analyzing him, seeing through him. Kaito wasn't sure if it was a good chill or a bad chill. He wasn't entirely certain yet if he liked having those dangerous eyes on him.

Maybe he didn't really want someone to understand him after all. Not if it meant subjecting himself to a gaze like that. It felt like he'd been mounted on a slide and stuck under a microscope for the detective to scrutinize…find fault with.

"I lived alone too, you know. At least…before _this_ happened, anyway." Sensing Kaito's sudden unease, Conan tried to direct the conversation back to more neutral ground.

"I know," Kaito replied, catching Conan off guard.

The detective visibly had a mental stutter before he responded, "H-How?"

Kaito drained the last of his milkshake with a shrug. "I've impersonated you before, haven't I?"

"On several occasions," Conan muttered, observably unhappy. "And entirely without permission."

Kaito ignored the reply and carried on with his explanation. "It's my practice to 'become' the person I replace. Sometimes I just wear someone else's face and use their voice, but…for people like you, I become the character. I wouldn't be able to fool Mouri-chan if not, and a mistake like that could land me in the hospital. In order to keep something like that from happening, I've been doing a better job of learning everything I can about the people I disguise as." It was a policy Kaito had really cracked down on ever since that highly unfortunate Sera Masumi incident. Just thinking about it made his glorious face hurt.

"So what you're telling me is that you've been stalking me." Conan's lip began to curl.

"It'd be stalking if I were doing it out of some sort of twisted desire to, I don't know, kidnap, torture, and eventually mount you on my wall," Kaito snorted as he rolled his eyes. "What I do is called reconnaissance."

Conan could only stare dumbly at the thief, slightly disturbed. "You're really creepy, you know that?"

"I could be mean and comment on the fact that you're living with your soon to be ex-girlfriend, watching her every move without her knowing about it," Kaito retorted. "…But that would be cruel, so I won't. I spy on people for work. It's a lot different from stalking people 'cause I'm a weirdo. Even when I do technically 'stalk', it's more out of concern than anything."

"And whom do you stalk out of concern?" Conan wondered out loud, not truly expecting an answer.

Kaito fidgeted. "People like you and Hakuba. People that get in trouble on a regular basis and require some looking after," the magician-thief replied.

Conan's eyes widened just slightly, almost imperceptibly. "Why do you care so much about the people trying to put you behind bars?"

Kaito shrugged looking down at his plate as he scooped up the second to last bite of rice and vegetables. "I like you guys. Even though you lack imagination and appreciation for true art, you're good guys, and I wouldn't want anything to happen to you. Besides, Hakuba, at least, is my friend."

"What about me?" Conan asked, unable to contain his curiosity. He'd always wondered what exactly the Kaitou Kid thought of him.

Kaito pushed back a long bang once more and replied nonchalantly without looking up at the detective, "I used to think of you as merely a critic of my work. A very harsh critic, but…nowadays, I'd have to say…you're more of a friendly rival than anything." And then, before Conan could comment, he asked, "You were about to share with me how you too had lived by yourself starting at a young age and, therefore, could kind of understand what it must have been like for me, weren't you?"

Thrown off by the quick change in direction of the conversation, Conan fumbled for a minute before he replied, "Y-Yeah. But…I guess I was a little different because I chose to be left behind when my parents went off to travel the world and run from my dad's editors."

"You stayed behind for _her_?" Kaito asked as if the answer didn't matter to him. Because it didn't matter. It shouldn't matter. …Did it matter? No. Not really. Kaito pushed around the remnants of his meal on the plate.

Conan shifted uncomfortably. "Y-Yeah. Sort of. I mean…there were a bunch of reasons, but…"

"That's nice," Kaito cut off any further response. "It's really romantic that you stayed for her," the magician sighed, feeling rather down again all of the sudden.

"Not _just_ for her," Conan reiterated, even as his cheeks turned as red as ripe mangos. "…There were other reasons."

"But she was the most important one. I know how this works, Tantei-kun. Don't bother with your fibs and denials. The only one you're lying to is yourself," Kaito chuckled with an obnoxious, know-it-all smirk.

"_Anyway_. It may have been my choice to stay behind, but it was still lonely sometimes, and often I'd really wish there had been someone there for me when I was sick or when I had a problem or a question. There are times when we all just want our mom or our dad around, and my parents weren't there for me during those times either. They…didn't come back very often." Conan's gaze fell to his half-eaten bowl of curry udon. "When I told them to go without me, I thought they'd come back and check on me, stay with me for a few months here and there, but…"

"Maybe you get it after all," Kaito chimed in softly. "Sorry for being sarcastic with you. That must have been really rough for you."

"I'm sure you had it worse," Conan chuckled wryly, shaking his head. "You were younger, and at least I could still talk to my parents, see them from time to time. You, with your father's passing and your mom's illness right after that…"

"Those facts don't diminish your pain at all, though," Kaito gently informed.

Conan looked at Kaito for a moment, studying the other's expression, seeing past the female disguise and looking at the poor, lonely boy that fate still wasn't quite done taking absolutely everything from yet.

"…Thanks," Conan finally replied, sounding genuinely grateful.

"No prob," Kaito chuckled, trying to lighten the heavy atmosphere. "I'm gonna get some annin doufu. You want anything?"

Conan blinked. "Weren't we going to go get ice cream after the curry?"

"Yeah." Kaito returned Conan's confused expression. "But did you want any dessert here _before_ we go for ice cream?"

"…Let me get this straight." Conan shot the thief a look of utter disbelief. "You're going to eat dessert here, and then you're going to go some other place and eat dessert there _too_?"

Kaito nodded, still not quite getting what the issue was. "Yeah, but I don't really see how one has anything to do with the other, Tantei-kun."

"You have a massive sweet tooth, don't you?" Conan sighed, wearing a deadpan expression.

"Yep," Kaito sang, proudly owning it. "Just like a real girl. Dessert is my favorite meal of the day."

Conan shook his head, thinking, _"This is what happens when you leave children to raise themselves. They end up surviving on sugar."_ …Or coffee and toast, in Shinichi's own case.

Still, Kaito got his annin doufu and savored it as he struck up a conversation about favorite pizza toppings. Kaito, of course, preferred dessert pizzas like chocolate pizza or fruit pizza, but whenever he did eat the regular kind, he usually got vegetables and cheese. Meanwhile, Conan sheepishly admitted to the resident vegetarian and ichthyophobe that he enjoyed teriyaki chicken or seafood on his pizza

After Dessert Round One had been finished off, they walked the short distance to the Shibuya Haagen-Dazs. The entire journey, Kaito chattered about the best chocolate parfait he had the other day at this place in Beika called Christie's.

"_Seriously_, Tantei-kun! There was, like, a whole cup of fudge and an entire cookie crumbled up in there! And then they put a truckload of chocolate whipped cream on top!"

All the while, Conan chuckled at his flamboyant companion.

At Haagen-Dazs, Kaito got a double scoop of chocolate fudge brownie while Conan stuck with a single scoop of coffee flavored.

"You have a mouth _full_ of cavities, don't you?" the detective snickered as the thief enthusiastically went to work, licking the cone like a lollipop.

"Not a one," Kaito retorted proudly, giving his dining partner an insanely wide grin of satisfaction.

Conan shook his head and took a half-hearted bite of his own ice cream. "You're something else, you know that?" he chuckled in reluctant amusement.

"What was I supposed to be?" Kaito wondered aloud around the ice cream cone in his mouth.

"Frankly? A crazy asshole," Conan snorted.

Kaito kindly decided not to go for either "Children shouldn't talk like that. You're gonna get your mouth scrubbed out with soap." or "You kiss your girlfriend with that mouth?" He figured both were touchy subjects at the moment considering that Kudo Shinichi was on the verge of losing the woman he loved due to his current "little" problem. Kaito knew that his rival was probably as tired and fed up as he himself was today, and Kaito didn't want to be insensitive since he knew how much it hurt.

Instead, he went for, "Well, I can assure you that I'm not entirely sane, but I'm much too pretty to be anything below the belt, so…"

Conan rolled his eyes, taking another bite of ice cream and allowing himself to actually enjoy the coffee flavor despite his still rather sullen mood.

"In all seriousness, though," Kaito continued, "Yes, I can be obnoxious and play mean tricks sometimes, but I'm not a bad guy."

With the raise of an eyebrow, Conan's expression said that he was doubtful.

"Oh, you're just biased because you've been on the receiving end of my pranks one too many times," Kaito pouted. "You only have such a poor opinion of me because you think we're on opposing teams."

"Are we not?" Conan challenged, interest piqued by this new side of Kid that he was getting to see.

Kaito smiled, a hint of mischief in his grin. "You see, Tantei-kun, I'm not the criminal you think I am."

Their eyes met, and Conan subconsciously found himself leaning forward, hanging on his rival's words.

"I'm a vigilante," Kaito softly announced in all sincerity…and then went back to lapping at his ice cream, killing the solemn mood.

Conan felt a little put out as the tension dropped. "And how do you figure? Or does that have something to do with your father's mission that you inherited?"

"Bingo. I must say, you're very sharp. Sometimes I don't give you enough credit, methinks," Kaito hummed, still with his lips locked firmly around the waffle cone.

Conan considered scolding Kid for his lewd manner of eating, but, for fear of the conversation turning even more indecent, he bit his tongue.

Instead the detective repeated, "You father's mission…which we're not talking about tonight?"

"Correct," Kaito intoned, removing the frozen treat from his mouth with a rather inappropriate-sounding slurp.

"Then answer me this," Conan forged on. "How old were you when you found out about your father leading a double life? About his secret identity?"

The easy, good-natured grin slowly faded from Kaito's face.

Conan quickly backpedaled. "Sorry! That was really personal. I didn't mean—"

"—Sixteen," Kaito replied, gazing at Conan with a searching look in his eyes. He was waiting in apprehension for what Shinichi would say in response.

Conan gulped, not breaking eye contact. "…And…how old were you when he…? If you don't mind me—"

"—Two hours in to being eight years old," Kaito responded honestly.

He wanted to finally talk about it, tell someone at last. At the same time, he didn't want to talk about it ever. But he needed someone to know. Hadn't he said that he wanted someone to understand? Well, Kudo Shinichi was there in front of him, asking the questions, volunteering a sympathetic ear.

"Eight years old," Conan muttered under his breath and then was silent for a bit as he looked down into his ice cream and thought about Ayumi and Genta and Mitsuhiko. They were all eight years old. They were cute and naïve. They were precocious, but they were innocent. He thought about one of them losing a parent at so young an age, what it would do to them. They had seen murder before, but…Kid was obviously not familiar with or comfortable around dead bodies as evidenced by his actions and behavior in the past when a corpse had shown up around a heist, so… When Kid was little, had he understood 'death'? Had Kid at one time been innocent as well? What would it have been like for him as a child? Was this the reason that Kid was all screwed up now?

"And then your mom…" Conan gasped when he realized it, thinking once again about the Tanteidan and imagining their reactions to having both parents torn away from them.

"She got sick, so she had to go to the hospital for a year or so…. She had a mental breakdown," Kaito confessed, still intently watching the expressions playing across Conan's face. So far he liked the emotions he was witnessing there.

Kaito got the feeling that Shinichi just wanted to hug him. To be honest, Kaito kind of liked the pity. He liked the way that his rival was finally showing some sympathy.

Conan looked back up at Kaito and demanded, "How old are you?"

Kaito shrugged. "You're older than I am. At least…Kudo Shinichi is older than I am. Not by too terribly much, but…"

"So…eighteen and a half-ish?" Shinichi did some quick mental calculations. "So you were sixteen when you found out about your dad and decided to bring Kid back…" he mumbled, imagining it all in his head.

Kaito closed his eyes, going back to the ice cream. "No."

Conan blinked. "No?" He reworked the math. "But…that should be right. You were sixteen when you…did you find out and then wait a few months to start up Kid and the mission in your dad's place, or—?"

"—You're misunderstanding something," Kaito cut in, finishing off the first scoop of chocolate fudge brownie and beginning work on the second. "I'm not the one that resurrected Kid. I only found out about my dad and all that _after_ Kid came back."

Conan stared at his companion in surprise, weighing Kaito's words. "Then…if _you_ didn't bring Kid back, who did?"

Kaito shrugged, not naming any names. "Doesn't matter. The point is that someone else did, I found out about Dad, and…I put on his old uniform and went to confront 'Kid', kind of hoping…" Kaito's voice cracked. "I mean…I just sort of thought that maybe…" He shook his head, trying to get rid of that line of thought, the sad memories, the heartbreaking disappointment that went with it.

"You thought that you were going to meet your father," Conan filled in the blank. "You thought that maybe he was still alive."

Kaito nodded. "It was stupid. I saw him get blown to bits with my own eyes."

Conan winced at the thought of an eight year-old witnessing something like that.

Kaito, too busy focusing on his ice cream so that he didn't break down again, didn't notice Conan's reaction. "There are still some times that I wonder, though. My old man was a brilliant magician. Maybe he could have…faked his death. Escaped. Maybe he's living in Miami or LA or New York or something with a new, mentally stable wife…a new son…one that's not…"

"Kid," Conan called softly, at a complete and total loss for words.

"…busted," Kaito concluded with a sigh.

There was nothing Shinichi could say in response to that. He wanted to spout some incredibly wise, comforting words, but none were coming to mind.

"Do you pity me, Tantei-kun?" Kaito chuckled, getting himself back together and smiling impishly at his rival. He had to do something to lift the gloom that had fallen over them. Kaito didn't want to feel weighed down by the heavy conversation topic either.

Conan looked up and considered the thief for a moment. "…Who wouldn't? Who wouldn't feel sorry for someone who's gone through everything that you have?"

Kaito shrugged. "The people that murdered my father, but… Does it make it harder for you to chase me, do you think? Knowing that I have a reason?"

"No, seeing as I still don't know what that reason is. I don't know if it's a good enough one or not," Conan replied logically, but he had to admit that he did feel conflicted.

"Ever the critic," Kaito teased. "Come on, Tantei-kun. Not even you are _that_ jaded. You're not a machine. You have to feel at least a little bad now, right?"

Conan shifted ever so slightly, but it was enough for Kaito to know that he'd won.

The detective sighed and confessed, "Okay, honestly? I liked it better when you were just a crazy asshole. It was easier that way, but now…now, more than anything, I just want to understand. I'm a detective. Not knowing is something that just…it drives me crazy, so…now that I know that there's more to you than meets the eye, I want to understand why you are the way you are, what's going on in that messed up head of yours."

Kaito shot Conan one of his just-this-side-of-insane Kid grins. "Hakuba was like that too in the beginning when he was first figuring things out."

Sapphire eyes narrowed.

"Hakuba…Saguru? The Superintendent's son?" Conan clarified, voice full of disbelief. Because there was no way in hell that _that_ Hakuba had anything to do with Kid besides hounding him, trying to put him behind bars.

"Yep. That's my Haku-chan," Kaito cooed.

Conan frowned, deeply troubled by this revelation. "Does he know you call him that?"

Kaito nodded.

"And he allows it?" Surprised did not even begin to cover how incredibly taken aback the sleuth was at the moment.

Kaito smiled sheepishly, shrugging his left shoulder. "You know, he only protests so much because he secretly likes it. He's really tsundere, but the guy's like my brother, I tell you."

"Riiight." Conan nodded slowly, feeling a little better now that his mental image of "Hakuba Saguru" had been restored.

"No, seriously," Kaito returned, an expression of sincerity on his face. "He is like my brother. He was the one that was really there for me at the end of this spring when I was first realizing that things were never gonna work between me and the girl I like so long as Kid's in the picture. He…He's my best friend…ever since he found out."

Shinichi mentally reviewed the information. Some of the wires in his head got crossed and started to spark. Hakuba was best friends with the Kaitou Kid? How did they make _that_ relationship work?

"So…you explained things to him, or he figured things out, and…he just accepted your reason. He just…understood?" Shinichi was having a hard time wrapping his mind around it.

Kaito nodded with a soft smile. "Yeah. He did."

He looked down at his hands. "…Do you think I will?" Shinichi wasn't so sure.

"I do," Kaito chuckled. "If anyone can understand, it's you."

After nearly a full minute of fighting a losing battle of a staring contest with his ice cream, Conan finally looked up and asked, "…Why are you telling me these things?"

"You asked." Kaito finished off his ice cream cone in three decisive bites.

Conan's brow crinkled, and his perplexed expression distorted into a frown. "People don't start volunteering information like that just because you ask. _You_, Kid, don't volunteer information period, so why…? Why me?"

"I'm telling you because I can." Kaito shrugged.

"…Because…you can," Conan parroted, still not getting it exactly. "So…you're telling me this on a whim?"

Kaito shook his head. "Not like that." Kaito sighed and reiterated, "I want someone to understand, and you might be the only one that's able to really, truly get it, so…I'm telling you because you're the only one that I really can tell. Get it now?"

Conan's eyes widened.

"Alcoholics have AA, fat people have Weight Watchers, and people with depression and eating disorders all have support groups, don't they?" Kaito bit his lip and concluded softly, "And I have you…tonight anyway."

Before Shinichi could get his thoughts in order and say anything in reply, Kaito stood, muttering, "Be right back."

Conan tried not to squawk as Kid headed into the women's restroom. The thief _was_ wearing a female disguise after all.

When the kaitou returned, he was bright and cheery again, chatting about a new bakery that had opened up not too far from here in the Haido District. Conan suspected that it was mostly an act, hiding the pain and insecurity Kid was truly feeling. The mask that Kid had deigned to take off for a few short hours had been put back on, and Shinichi knew that he wouldn't be having any more serious discussions with his rival tonight.

They parted ways at Beika Station, and the detective was left wondering if he'd ever get another opportunity like that again. Had that been his only chance to unravel the mystery that was "Kid"? He certainly hoped not.

He couldn't help but wonder about Kid's mission, his reason for being a thief. Conan's head was spinning with thoughts of Kid's father's murder, the perpetrators that were likely still running free, how in the world Kid had found out about his dad, and who had brought the thief back from the grave in the first place. Shinichi couldn't sleep as he pondered the girl that Kid was in love with, the sad smile on his rival's face, his relationship with Hakuba Saguru, and pretty much every other thing that Kid had said to him that night.

Shinichi stared at the ceiling and tuned out Old Man Mouri's snores with thoughts of Kid. He went back over the conversation, every word, every expression, every movement.

He was a detective. He needed to solve this mystery. With every fiber of his being, he needed to know the truth.

He was to spend many a sleepless night thinking about Kid until the day that he finally got his answers from the mouth of the thief himself.

…...

Mikau: Okay, so not as angsty as the first chapter, but they can't all be that deep and depressing. That would be overkill. Anyway, I still think they had some really good discussions this chapter. I think that'll lay the foundation for their friendship coming up. Still, I hope you enjoyed it. Have a great day, everyone!


	3. Warmth

Mikau: Hi there, everyone! I've got a nice friendship chapter today between Haku-chan and Kaito for you. I think that it turned out pretty well for the most part, so I hope you enjoy it! Thanks a bunch to all of the reviewers from last time: Ern Estine 13624, Bunnyz-chan, Kimmiko T, kakashikrazy256, Kitty Offline, Miss Emotion, Assasin8, osa-chan, Guest, and Orange4! Also, I've got a lot of new, exciting stuff happening. Check out Summer Glow, a HeiKai friendship fic that may turn into actual HeiKai if I ever continue it. There's Nightmares, a reaction fic to the Dark Knight episode that's 2/3 angst and 1/3 comedy. Also, I have a new HakuShin fic called Endings Are Only New Beginnings. Okay. Enough advertisement. On with the show!

Disclaimer: If I owned it, I'd have a ton of fun coming up with all sorts of coded riddles. I've actually got a nice collection started. I'm going to have to write more heists.

…...

Chapter Three: Warmth

Kaito returned to his dark, empty abode feeling slightly better than he had when he'd left.

The thought of losing Aoko and her seeing someone else still hurt like a knife being shoved down his throat, but…after spending the evening with Kudo, baring his soul to the one person that just might be able to understand, and sharing some laughs and lively conversation…the pain in his chest was more of a dull ache than the searing, sucking, gaping wound that it had been.

Kaito went up to his room once again, this time going to the trouble of turning on the light and changing into his pajamas.

He took a minute to look at his father's portrait, studying his idol's face.

"Sorry about earlier," he whispered, but there was no response.

With a sigh, Kaito flopped down on his bed. "It's better that you can't answer," he muttered, grabbing Sassy, his stuffed llama, and hugging her to his chest. "It would be worse if you were still alive. I don't think I could take it if you actually _had_ just abandoned me, left me for all these years. I'd rather you stay dead…stay the way you are in my memories, 'cause I don't think I'd survive the heartbreak and disappointment if you really were still alive somewhere out there.

Kaito grabbed his phone off of the nightstand, intending to set an alarm, and it was then that he noticed that he had twenty missed calls…all from Hakuba Saguru.

Quickly checking the time and making sure it was still okay to call, Kaito punched the button for speed dial.

"Kuroba, where are you?" the Brit demanded as soon as the call connected. "I've been worried sick! Why haven't you been answering your phone?"

"Sorry. I didn't have it with me. But I'm home now, and I'm okay, so…" Kaito bit his lip, hoping that Hakuba wouldn't ask too many questions.

"Where have you been for the past three hours and twenty-two point forty-one seconds?"

The blonde was glaring at him on the other end of the line. Kaito could feel those molten gold eyes boring holes through him.

"Because you were certainly NOT okay when we dropped you off at your house earlier," Hakuba raged on. "And I would have stayed, but Aoko-kun was there, and you looked like you wanted to get away from her, so I didn't want to raise her suspicion. And then she ended up inviting me in, and I couldn't say no, and by the time I got back to your house, you were gone."

"I just needed some space…to clear my head, so…I was out jumping off of skyscrapers in downtown Beika."

There was silence, and then Hakuba heaved an enormous sigh before breaking into a fond chuckle. "Only you would go diving off of buildings in order to clear your head…. Are you better now?"

Kaito thought about it for a moment. "Yeah. A little bit. Enough," he decided.

"Do you need to talk? You could come over or I could come over or…?" Saguru offered.

Kaito chewed on the inside of his cheek in thought. "You know, I think I'm good. I actually talked with someone else, so…"

Hakuba's brow creased. "While you were sky diving?"

"After that," Kaito chuckled. "I had a date."

Saguru's frown deepened. "Oh?" The single syllable carried with it a litany of inquiries.

Kaito ignored most of the unspoken questions like: "Who is this person?", "How long have you known them?", "How did you meet?", and "Have you run a background check on them yet, or shall I?"

"Yeah. He's nice. We ate curry and got ice cream afterwards," Kaito replied with a jester's grin. He was having too much fun with this joke.

"Does he know that you're not actually a woman?" was the Englishman's chief concern.

"…I…think so?" He was pretty sure that the shrunken detective knew for certain that Kid was male, but…Kaito did dress up as an awfully convincing woman on a regular basis, so…

"Kaito," Hakuba called in a rather severe tone, causing the magician to jump.

The use of his given name meant that his friend was serious.

"Kaito," Saguru repeated. "You're in absolutely no emotional state to be dating right now. You're vulnerable. I know you; you're going to end up transferring all of your feelings for Aoko-kun onto this…this guy, and you're going to become convinced that you're in love with him. Then, you're going to be a bloody mess when things don't work out, and Kaito, as your friend, I cannot allow you to do this to yourself."

"It wasn't actually a date," Kaito offered rather lamely when Saguru's impassioned speech came to its conclusion. "I was joking. I mean… Yeah, I ate with the guy, and we talked, but…I wasn't seriously flirting with him. You know how I am. I was just playing around, and it's not like I'm actually going to fall for _him_ of all people, so—"

"—Wait. Kaito," Saguru brought the magician to a sudden stop midsentence. "You…seriously had curry and ice cream and talked and flirted with someone?"

"Not '_seriously_'. Not the flirting part, but…yeah?" Kaito rolled over onto his stomach, all of the sudden feeling as if he had done something wrong.

Hakuba took a deep breath, removing his reading glasses and rubbing the bridge of his nose. "What's his name?"

Kaito didn't reply right away.

"I want his name. If he's going to be sniffing around you, if you're going to see him again, I—"

"—Haku-chan, _seriously_. It's not—"

"—His _name_, Kaito. The terms are non-negotiable."

Kaito sighed in defeat. "Don't overreact."

"I can assure you I will react appropriately," Saguru snorted. "You are the one that does not assign the proper gravity to the situation."

"You're going to overreact," Kaito grumbled.

"At my own discretion."

"Edogawa Conan."

Saguru said nothing for a moment as those two words were processed.

And then: "God, Kaito! Are you smegging out of your mind?!"

Kaito removed the phone from his ear and muttered, "Now as always."

"That child is vicious and dangerous and…and… There's something just NOT right about him. What were you thinking?! Just thought you'd flirt with the enemy? Take him out to tea? See how long it takes him to get your finger prints or your DNA? See how long it takes until the police show up with an arrest warrant because you decided to play cat and mouse outside of the heists with the child known as your natural predator?" Hakuba demanded incredulously. "This is beyond crazy, Kuroba. This is just stupid."

"I don't expect you to get it," Kaito replied softly into the receiver. He let go of the anger and annoyance he felt. He didn't have the energy to express them.

His friend's quiet, exhausted tone gave Saguru pause. The magician was lowering his walls and showing just how drained he was.

Hakuba swallowed hard before he responded, "…I'm sorry I've been so busy lately. I feel like I haven't had a lot of time for you the past couple weeks because of the Nagoya case…. We haven't talked much."

"That's okay. Your work is important." Kaito shrugged it off as he curled up into a ball under the covers. "Those three kids are waiting to find out who killed their mom. Your attention is in the right place."

Saguru shook his head, folding up his reading glasses and putting them in their case. He stood up from his desk and went to stand by the sliding glass door out to the balcony. "Kuroba, you're important too. You get that, don't you? That you're important to me?"

"Yeah," Kaito whispered. "But—"

"—No. No buts," Hakuba interjected. "Not from you and not from me either. No excuses. I need to make you my priority sometimes."

"What are you? My boyfriend?" Kaito chuckled, burrowing into the pillows.

"I may as well be," Saguru snickered.

"We need to get you a girlfriend," Kaito laughed right back.

"No thank you." Saguru could only roll his eyes. "I have no time for a girlfriend. I'm married to my work."

"Isn't Kid your work?" Kaito teased. "Did we get married while I wasn't paying attention?"

"You're such a loon," Hakuba laughed. "But in all honesty, I'm your friend, Kuroba, and you're my best friend, so…I need to make time for you."

"Thanks," Kaito hummed, feeling comfortably warm at Saguru's words, as if he'd just had a luscious cup of rich hot chocolate accompanied by fudge brownies, fresh from the oven. "You know I really appreciate you being there for me, right?"

"As much as I appreciate you reciprocating," Saguru chuckled. "…Kaito? How are you doing? Are you okay?"

The magician sighed. "Aoko's gonna start dating that Yamada guy. She told me today."

The detective winced. "Ah. I was afraid of that. I had hoped that you wouldn't notice, but…yes. He's been making eyes at her for a while now."

"Yeah," Kaito mumbled.

"Yeah," Saguru echoed. "Is there anything I can do?"

"Nah. Thanks, though." Kaito stretched, spreading out like a starfish. "I…that's why I went jumping off buildings. On the way home, I ran into Tantei-kun at the park, and I slapped on a quick disguise and dropped in on him. He was taking some of his own frustrations out on a soccer ball at the time, so…"

"He's not a normal little kid, is he?" Saguru hummed in thought.

"No, he's not," Kaito returned.

"I haven't interacted with him much, but…I've noticed that he pretends to be a dopey kid sometimes, hides his intelligence. I used to do that. It was a defense mechanism. People don't like bratty little kids that are smarter than them. Little kids don't like little kids that are smarter than they are, so…I used to pretend I wasn't very bright sometimes…so that people might like me. It never worked. I was no good at being normal, but…he seems to have a good group of friends, doesn't he?" Saguru asked hopefully.

"Yeah. The Shounen Tanteidan are a great bunch…. They're just not geniuses. You know as well as I do how lonely that can be," Kaito mumbled into the receiver.

"Yes. When no one can keep up with you? Yes. I don't have to imagine. That was our existence just a few short years ago, wasn't it? Before we found each other?" Hakuba smiled softly at the memory of their meeting and several failures later when he finally knew he had met his match.

"Speak for yourself. I'm still smarter than you are. I'm still lonely," Kaito teased.

Saguru was quiet for a moment before he replied, "True. I do hope I amuse you somewhat, though? And you have Conan-kun besides. Surely he is your mental match."

"Haku-chan, you know I'm kidding," Kaito snorted. "Before you came, I died a little inside every time the Taskforce went after the dummy. You saved me from my solitude of boredom. You know I acknowledge you as my equal."

"Even though I'm not." Saguru could barely contain a grin at Kaito's heartfelt praise.

"You know what? Shut up, you masochist." Kaito rolled his eyes, hearing the chuckle in Hakuba's voice.

"Never…. So…where are Conan-kun's parents? Do you know?" Saguru got them back on their sober topic.

Kaito shrugged. "Traveling. They left him behind. Well, he chose to stay with the Mouris, but…"

"He's got a lot on his plate for an eight year-old, doesn't he?" Saguru noted gravely, easily able to relate to what he imagined Conan's situation to be.

"I'm sure we don't know the half of it," Kaito mumbled and then continued with his narrative. "Earlier, like I was saying, I ran into him in the park, and…he was in bad shape. We both were, so…we talked. Serious things, ridiculous things…we talked for two whole hours or more. It was really, really good, Haku-chan. I mean, he just…he's so smart, and he's funny. Most of all, he just gets it. I've never meet someone that could empathize with me like that. I mean, you _sympathize _with me, Saguru, and you've saved me so many times, and I'm really grateful to you for being there for me, but…empathy is just…I can't…I don't know how to describe it, but it's the best feeling ever."

And now Hakuba was concerned once more. "Kuroba…not to try to diminish your elation at having found a new friend, but…do remember that he's eight."

"He's not eight," Kaito snapped. "Mentally, anyway. Mentally, he's…" The anger left him, and Kaito chuckled, "…eighty."

"Be that as it may, his body is that of a child," Saguru ventured forth tentatively. "Do try not to get carried away."

Kaito took a breath, intending to use it to gripe and snarl that, no, he was not going to get carried away, and he was practically an adult, so…but then he realized that his friend was just trying to look out for him. Saguru truly cared about Kaito and wanted him to be safe and happy and healthy. Saguru didn't fully understand the whole situation, so…

Kaito let it go.

With a smile he whispered, "Thanks, Haku-chan. Look, I'll talk to you later, okay? I'm gonna head to bed."

"All right," Hakuba replied with a sigh. "All right. You take care of yourself, Kuroba, and _do_ call me if you need anything. You know I'm always there for you, right?"

"Yeah," Kaito chuckled. "I know. Thank you, and right back at you, buddy. Night, night."

"Goodnight, Kuroba."

Kaito set the phone down on the nightstand and settled into the covers with a sigh.

He hugged Sassy, the stuffed llama, to his chest once more as he curled up for warmth.

Why did the house suddenly seem so cold? It was late summer, early fall. It was still warm out, so…maybe it was all the thoughts spinning around his head. They were sapping the energy and the warmth right out of him.

His mind was flooded with thoughts of his father, Aoko, Hakuba, and Tantei-kun. Well, mostly it was Aoko and Tantei-kun giving him the large part of the trouble.

The former…he was still angst-ing over her, even though he felt a little better now than he had earlier. He'd given up hope of anything coming of his love for Aoko months ago. He had talked about it extensively with Hakuba, but…but officially letting go was still painful.

Losing Aoko was like losing an arm. She'd been an important part of him for so long that he didn't know what to do without her. He'd have to adjust, relearn how to do some things.

He wasn't looking forward to it.

And then there was Tantei-kun…Con—Kudo…. Hmm. Shinichi? _Tantei-kun._ There was _Tantei-kun_ who was currently making him feel all out of sorts after those crazy deep conversations they'd had. That was the most honest Kaito had been with another human being in, surely, _years_. Well…except for a few months ago with Hakuba when he'd spilled his guts and they'd truly become close, but…you know. Before the whole thing with Hakuba, it had been years since he'd been that honest with another animate being besides his birds.

It was kind of freeing being that completely frank with someone. Kaito liked how it made him feel. Except…at the same time, sharing everything, all of those personal things with Tantei-kun, sort of made him feel sick to the stomach.

He found himself going over everything they'd discussed and shuddering. He couldn't believe that he'd said all that! And then other times he'd giggle, utterly giddy. It had been so great to finally get some of that stuff off of his chest.

After much consideration, finally he came to the conclusion that tonight had been good for him. Talking to Tantei-kun, getting it all out, actually talking about it with someone that understood was beneficial no matter how sick or giddy it made him feel afterwards. This was good. This was healthy.

At least it made him feel better.

When he'd been jumping off of those buildings and screaming his frustrations out along with his lungs, it had felt like that was it: the end of the world. Aoko was leaving him behind, so what was the point in going on? But then…Tantei-kun had given him a little glimmer of hope. There were other broken people out there in the world going through some of the stuff he was. He wasn't alone. He didn't have to deal with it all on his own anymore. He had Hakuba, and now he had…Shinichi as well.

He was a little apprehensive about the future, but…there was eager anticipation mixed in there too. It was hard to describe, this feeling. It was like a stick of dynamite about to go off. He had all of this pent-up, explosive energy.

…And thinking about all this anymore was not going to do him any good. He needed to go to sleep, and going over the evening again and again was only getting him wired. If he didn't sleep, he'd be bouncing off the walls in class tomorrow. He'd be irritable and end up playing a very nasty prank on someone whose last name started with Ya and ended in –mada.

And Aoko would be soooo pissed at him.

And he wasn't sure he could deal with that, the way he was feeling. Normally he'd brush it off or trick her into forgetting her anger, but…

And that was enough of that. Bed time.

He turned his thoughts off like a radio, silencing all of the chatter inside his head.

He felt blank, numb. Which was good for sleeping.

With another deep breath, he drifted off.

He couldn't remember what he had dreamt about in the morning, but he got the feeling that it had been unpleasant. He didn't feel rested at all. He wasn't really surprised, though, what with everything that had happened the previous day.

He went to school armed with his poker face. Only it was shaping up to be a rather thin shield today. He laughed and he joked, causing mischief, wreaking havoc like usual, but his heart wasn't in it.

Still, knowing that Saguru was there for him helped as well as the fact that there was someone else out there going through a long, drawn-out breakup of sorts with a beloved childhood friend.

He was a little embarrassed to admit it, but what helped more was what he overheard Keiko mention to Kaede during lunch. Apparently, the place in Haido where Kaito usually liked to buy his heels was having a buy one get one half off sale this weekend.

That put a spring in his step. He couldn't wait to get a new pair of stilettos so tall and so pointy that the heel could actually be used as…well, you know. A stiletto. He could really use a pair of red ones. Oh! And some strappy heels! And maybe some wedges? He had that one dress that he needed to find wedges to go with. But that was three pairs. He needed a fourth since the fourth pair would be half price anyway. He could get some with buckles! But he needed some new stripper heels too. And some platforms! And maybe a fun color like yellow? But that would only be seven. He needed an eighth pair. Would it be too ridiculous if he got some with big bows on them?

He was getting giddy just thinking about it. There were times when he wished he had been born a girl so that he could dress up all the time. Only…then he would miss out on all the fun of being a guy. He really liked being a man, but he really liked women's clothing too. If only the world were more accepting of his preferences. Well, as it stood, he was a guy about seventy-five to eighty percent of the time, and he just didn't have enough opportunities to wear the shoes, so it was hard to justify buying them.

He'd have to plan more heists…in a setting where it would be appropriate to wear stripper heels. Hmm. Were there any clubs or bars hosting any large, priceless gemstones? He'd have to do research.

Regardless! Kaito knew how he was spending his weekend. Retail therapy would do him some good.

Too bad Kaito's relaxing shopping spree didn't turn out as well as he'd hoped.

…

Mikau: I don't know how I feel about this chapter. Some parts I really like, and then the rest is… I always say stuff like that, though. There are few chapters that I'm really, truly happy with. Oh well. Hopefully you guys enjoyed this chapter. Let me know what you thought!


	4. Distress Flare

Mikau: Hi all! Glad to have you back for chapter four! Actually, this chapter is my entry for the Poirot Café forum's writing competition number six. The theme is "Help", and when thinking about what I was going to do for that, the idea for this chapter was born. So if you enjoy this chapter, thank the Poirot writing contest because I wouldn't have thought of this otherwise. Voting starts this weekend. Before we get started, I'd like to thank all of the reviewers from last time: Kimmiko T, Ern Estine 13624, Ambiguous Cake, bluesnowflakes21, Assasin8, Guest, Bunnyz-chan, farawisa (times two), and Miss Emotion! Also, I have a new fic. It's a collection of five sentence fics with all sorts of characters, pairings, and genres, so check it out. It's called Just Passing Through. Additionally, I have a new HakuKai fic called Quietly Starving. Also, chapter two of Endings are Only New Beginnings is up, so there's a lot going on. Check it out!

Disclaimer: If I owned it, I'd really like to do an episode that focuses on Haibara. I seem to like focusing on one particular character. I think because canon has a huge cast of minor characters that never get fleshed out, I want to go in there and give everyone a backstory.

…

Chapter Four: Distress Flare

Kaito didn't know why he had such a bad feeling when he rolled out of bed that Saturday morning. Okay, so the whole week had been crap what with the continued deterioration of his relationship with Aoko, woman that he loved, but…today was supposed to be the day that he went out there and changed his recent string of bad luck.

Today, Kaito was going shopping.

His favorite shoe store over at the Haido City Shopping Mall was having a sale, and he planned to buy at least eight new pairs. Though, honestly, the list was quickly growing as he thought of item after item currently missing from his wardrobe.

Some people ate their feelings. Kaito bought women's shoes.

…Yes. He was well aware that he should probably see someone about that. Thank you.

And yet…he couldn't shake the feeling that something bad was going to happen as he made a quick breakfast out of the leftover rice.

After he'd finished his omraisu, Kaito hopped in the shower, and then it was off to the guestroom where he kept his…well, his _other_ closet.

Part of the fun of going shoe shopping was getting dressed up for it. Kaito was seriously looking forward to donning his little mini skirt and scandalous halter-top.

Half an hour of primping and perfecting his disguise later, he was ready to go, indistinguishable from an actual woman. Today he was playing the role of Candy Jones, an American here for summer vacation. She was twenty-two, blonde, and had the most beautiful navy blue eyes that colored contacts could provide. Her IQ was negligible, and her hobbies included partying and dancing on tables. She currently had three boyfriends.

Kaito really enjoyed dressing up as a slut because it was a true test of his skill. Either he pulled it off or he failed miserably. With such skimpy clothing, there was nothing for him to hide behind. He liked feeling vulnerable and exposed like that. He liked the thrill of danger. And he felt the most sense of accomplishment when he saw that _look_ on other men's faces, the look that read, "That is the hottest chick I have ever seen." Pulling off "skank" made Kaito feel victorious.

One last time, Kaito adjusted his cleavage to keep it from popping out all over the place, tugged his skirt down just a bit to keep his lacey thong from showing too much, checked his cherry red lipstick in the mirror, and then he was ready to go.

Action.

It was better than Kaito ever could have hoped. The selection was magnificent! They had dozens of styles in at least fifty different colors! And the prices were reasonable! And they were all buy one get one half off!

Kaito almost cried tears of joy, but that would have been out of character for Candy. Instead he gave a little happy squeal and sauntered off to get down to the business of shopping.

It was still early, and the store wasn't quite busy yet. Kaito had about an hour before the rush would come, and that was just enough time to get in, luxuriate in the sight, smell, and feel of new shoes, and then get out before the crowd came.

As it stood, there were only about ten other people there at the little shop, not including the staff. The aisles were tiny, and the store wasn't laid out very well, so Kaito had to squeeze by the other customers in order to get to his section. Kaito automatically counted them out of habit as he passed. He was used to counting cops while in disguise, so…

There was a little old couple, bickering lovingly. The wife was trying to convince her husband to get a bigger size since his feet swelled, but he wouldn't hear of it. There was a young woman just a few years older than Candy there by herself, picking out low heels, presumably for work. A little gaggle of teenage girls was in aisle three, kya-kya-ing over some boots that Kaito really hoped they had in his size. There was a weird, creeper-looking guy over in the men's section dressed all in black and having a serious internal debate over a pair of oxfords. He couldn't decide if he wanted the mahogany pair or the tan. Go for mahogany, Bro. And then there was a pair of young women, again, somewhere around twenty-seven, trying to find a pair of wedges in the skinnier of the two's size. Kaito crossed his fingers for a pair that fit him as well. Those were _super_ cute and just perfect for the dress he'd bought the other day.

Darn his enormous feet. Well, they were actually a little small for a Japanese male, but they were on the large size for a Japanese woman, and since he was buying women's shoes… He just wished he could wear a smaller size, is all.

At least he had the section pretty much to himself. And it was nice to have full use of that cramped aisle so that he could strut and prance, trying out the new shoes before deciding that they were worthy of adding to his collection.

Kaito did a little turn, checking out the cute pair of pumps in the small mirror on the side of the bench. It was really only tall enough to give him a good view of his ankles and calves, not a full body shot, but…man. He had some seriously sexy ankles and calves.

Kaito held in a chortle at this revelation. Instead he giggled in character. It kind of came out sounding like Akako's signature "Hohoho", but he could live with that. Man, he was hot!

Kaito paused his egocentric narcissism fest as the perfect pair of stilettos came into sight. They were harlot scarlet and unreasonably, break-your-neck-falling-off-of-these tall, and he _had_ to have them. Only they seemed to run a bit big. He'd need a smaller size, which meant he had to go back to the previous aisle.

He turned the corner just in time to see the OL who had been searching for shoes she could work in crumpling on the ground not three feet in front of Kaito, blood soaking the front of her blouse. There was a knife sticking out of her chest at an odd angle, probably piercing one of her lungs. Her eyes were wide in shock and pain, and she reached out to Kaito, making a small, strangled rasping sound before she stopped moving all together.

Several things happened at around the same time. Kaito wasn't really sure of the order, but he fell. He probably took a step back first. That would make more sense because he remembered taking a step back, and it would be unnatural to fall first and then take the step back. And one of the heels broke off of his shoes. They were super tall, and the heel was very skinny, so when he stepped back...

Okay, so the order was probably: Kaito took a startled step back, and the heel of his shoe snapped, sending him falling to the ground…where the blood was beginning to pool. Where the young woman's corpse was lying, staring sightlessly at him, face contorted in…fear…pain…anger?

Suddenly images of a theatre aflame played before his eyes. The smell of smoke and ash filled his lungs, making them burn. The theatre was collapsing. He was eight years old, and his mother was beside him shrieking, face twisted in fear, pain, anger. Flames engulfed the stage, gorging themselves on his father's props, his father's body buried under the fallen beams. The audience, now a mob much like a frightened, stampeding herd, pressed on all sides, and Kaito was afraid he'd be crushed. People were screaming.

Kaito was the one screaming.

And who should come running but Edogawa Conan? The detective took one look at the scene and cursed under his breath. He turned to Kaito and said something.

But Kaito's ears were still ringing with the sinister sounds of lapping, laughing flames, and he couldn't hear. He tried to read the other boy's lips, but he couldn't focus.

Suddenly Tantei-kun was gone, probably off to order around the cashiers and the mall security to ensure that no one got in or out.

And then Kaito wasn't entirely sure what happened. He'd probably fainted. The next thing he knew, he was sitting on one of the benches with a cool towel on the back of his neck, and the police were swarming the place.

Kaito mentally cursed. He'd been totally off guard, and that was why the sight of the…well, it wasn't even a corpse. Corpses were still hard for him to handle, but he _could_ handle it through sheer willpower and poker face. What he'd seen was a woman die. That…that was a hundred times more traumatic, watching the life drain away from her, watching as it faded from her eyes. That…was going to haunt him for a few months…if not longer. Kaito was really, really _bad_ with death.

Still. He was angry with himself for letting it affect him so much that he had completely blacked out. He was in disguise. True, he wasn't doing anything wrong this time, but…he was in disguise, and he had to be more vigilant.

I mean, just look at the mess he was in. There were police officers in droves, and they were going to start asking questions. Like, "Who are you?"

Well, Kaito was Candy Jones right now. Only she didn't actually exist. He had no ID, and they were going to ask for it, and they were going to get suspicious because they were going to find out "Candy Jones" didn't exist. And suspicious people that weren't actually who they were pretending to be often got blamed for crimes. Especially when they had been the ones to find the body.

And they were going to take him to the station and fingerprint him and put him in jail and find out about the whole cross-dressing thing and discover his true identity, and…

Dammit. He was going to get put away for life all because it was socially unacceptable for Kuroba Kaito to buy women's shoes. He was being discriminated against. There needed to be a social movement or something. He was being deprived of his rights.

Kaito forced his mind to slow down and focus. He shoved all of the useless chatter out of his head and concentrated on forming a plan. How was he going to get out of this? How was he going to escape without rousing the suspicion of the police…along with the added challenge of dodging Tantei-kun as well?

He sighed. All he could think was, _"Crap. I'm completely and utterly screwed."_

And now the police were looking at him. They kept glancing at him and talking.

That wasn't good.

And then Megure-keibu cleared his throat and called out, "Is there anyone here that speaks English? Anyone who could translate?"

Kaito blinked. He spoke English, but he didn't really want to draw more attention to himself by volunteering, but if they really needed a translator…if some poor foreigner was hurt or in trouble and needed help understanding…

Luckily, Tantei-kun raised his hand and reported that he'd spent a lot of his fictional childhood in the states.

Megure blinked but quickly accepted Conan's services, asking the kid to go over and see what that young lady had to say about what happened. They'd go themselves, but they didn't want to crowd her since she seemed to be recovering from a pretty advanced stage of shock.

And Kaito was a little confused. What young lady? Megure had pointed over in Kaito's direction, but…Oh. OH. Haha. Right. Candy Jones. Get it together and get into character, Kuroba.

The shrunken detective approached, all soft, disarming smiles. He greeted Kaito in a gentle voice. "Hi, Miss. How are you feeling?"

"Frankly? Sick. Dizzy and kind of like I need to go throw up. You?" Kaito replied honestly in Candy's voice.

"I'm okay. Thanks," Conan replied in his childish, slightly accented English. "Miss, the police want to know what you saw. Did you just find the body, or…she was still warm when I got there not even a minute after I heard you scream, so…it couldn't have been long. Could you tell me what you saw?"

Kaito opened his mouth to reply, but then he thought better of it. If he were a key witness, he'd have to appear in court. They'd do a background check on him and…once again, he'd be locked away just because he couldn't resist a sale.

It wasn't like Kaito had seen anything of importance anyway.

Scrunching his eyes closed as the scene of the OL writhing and dying on the floor, blood seeping into the carpet, played once more on his eyelids. He shook his head and insisted, "I didn't see anything."

Conan's face hardened, and he scanned Kaito: the body language, the tone of voice, every micro-expression, all the little details that a normal person would miss. He looked at Kaito and read him like a neon sign screaming "LIAR!"

And yet he didn't press. He simply replied, "Okay. Well, let me know if you remember anything, Miss, and I'll tell the police. You never know what could be helpful. Even if it doesn't seem important to you, it could be the key to solving the murder and getting closure for that girl's family."

And that was all Conan had to say to set his hook in Kaito's heart.

Because that OL had a family that deserved to know who killed their daughter, their sister, their wife, their mother. That family deserved to know what happened, and Kaito had seen the Meitantei put the whole puzzle together going off of nothing more than a speck of dust before. Maybe Kaito had seen something after all. It might not seem like anything of importance to him, but…he had long ago accepted that Kudo Shinichi saw things that other people didn't.

At that point, having said his peace, Conan turned to leave, off to give a brief report to Megure before beginning his own investigation.

"W-Wait," Kaito whispered, reaching out and catching Conan by the shoulder. "Tantei-kun…wait."

Conan froze, slowly turning to face "Candy" once more. His eyes widened in recognition this time, and he hissed under his breath, "KID?! What the hell are you doing here?!"

"In _English_," Kaito whispered back, still in Candy's voice in case they were overheard. "I don't speak Japanese." Kaito looked at his shrunken rival mournfully. "And I was shoe shopping. There was a sale."

Conan frowned disapprovingly.

"Hey! I'm a legitimate customer!" Kaito whined, thoroughly insulted. "Did I send a heist notice? No. I wasn't stealing anything. I was just…I needed some new high heels to go with some outfits I just bought, so…and I can't very well go shopping for women's shoes as a _man_, can I? So…here I am, parading around in hooker-wear, pretending to be someone I'm not with no ID at the scene of a murder to which I'm probably the primary suspect."

"But you didn't do it," Conan replied calmly, and it was a statement, not a question.

"No, I didn't," Kaito confirmed in a small voice, squeezing his legs together, rounding his shoulders and making himself as small as he could.

He felt weak—physically and mentally. He was tired, drained. All of his confidence had gone out from him, and he was scared. His poker face was cracking. He knew he shouldn't show his distress in front of his…whatever Tantei-kun was, but…he felt lost and alone, the images from those terrible flashbacks of his father's death still playing in his mind.

For once his disguise made him feel defenseless. He felt naked, and he just wanted to cover himself up so that Tantei-kun couldn't see him. He had nothing to work with, no tools, no plan. He tried to fight back this defeatist attitude that had overtaken him, but he found himself drowning in the waves of despair. It was all over. He was lost. He had lost.

"I'm going to prove it," Conan stated with all the confidence that Kaito just wasn't feeling right now.

Kaito blinked, false eyelashes inadvertently batting. "What?"

"I'm going to prove that you didn't do it," Conan announced in his funny-sounding English.

Kaito, mind still addled, stared at the detective, utterly nonplussed. "How?"

"I'm going to find the real culprit," he responded matter-of-factly, as if he did this every Saturday.

"H-How?" The situation seemed so hopeless.

"You're going to tell me everything you saw, heard, smelled, and tasted since you entered that shop, and then I'm going to put the clues together," Conan reported.

The way he said it, how could Kaito help but believe in him? But…

Kaito winced as the memories of the dying girl, the fire at the theatre came rushing back at him with all the intensity of the blaze that had stolen his father from him that night.

Trembling, he screwed his eyes shut and shook his head. "I-I can't. I can't. I didn't see anything."

"Of course you did." Conan rolled his eyes, thinking nothing of Kid's theatrics, assuming that the thief was only playing the part. "You have an eidetic memory. You're the best witness I could ever ask for; you saw _everything_. Now stop play acting and tell me what you saw."

"I-I…I didn't…it happened so fast. I knew something was wrong, and I tried to tell my mom. I had seen that trick hundreds of times, but…something wasn't right, and there was an explosion," Kaito muttered, eyes wide in terror as the events of that night unfolded right before them yet again. He didn't even see Conan anymore. "And Dad…the beams fell. They crashed on top of him, and everything was on fire, and the screaming…the screaming…the crowd was…and I thought I was going to be trampled, but—"

Finally realizing that something was _seriously_ wrong, Conan tried to snap Kaito out of it.

"—H-Hey. Hey, Kid. Hey, look at me." He took the thief's face in his hands and made what he hopped where soothing noises. "Kid, you're alright. You're okay," he tried while Kaito continued to blather almost incoherently, shaking violently.

Conan got up on the bench beside the thief and patted him on the back, continuing the shushing noises while making calming circles with the palm of his hand.

Kaito seemed to respond to that, closing his eyes and taking deep breaths, coming back into awareness of the present.

"Okay?" Conan hesitantly inquired when it looked like Kaito had settled down from his panic attack…number two of the day.

Kaito shook his head, ashamed that he had let his rival see him fall to pieces. He was supposed to be the indomitable Kaitou Kid, but…he was acting more like "Candy Jones" at the moment.

Conan bit his lip as he awkwardly withdrew, hopping down from the bench and giving Kid some space. This investigation wasn't going to go anywhere quickly without Kid's input, though, so he needed the thief to talk. The police had already scoured the scene, and they hadn't found much. Conan himself had taken a look, but with such heavy foot traffic in the mall…the security cameras in the shop weren't even real, and there hadn't been physical evidence beyond the knife left behind. The suspects, if you could call them suspects, had nothing in common with the victim. They didn't have much to go on, so if Kid could just tell him what he had seen—something! Anything! The slightest clue would be welcome. Only…Kid didn't appear able to talk at the moment.

With a sigh, Conan mumbled, "You really do have an eidetic memory, huh?"

"Yeah. Lucky me," Kaito sighed, more tired than ever. One thing was for certain: he was too weak to escape now.

Chewing on the inside of his cheek, Conan was silent in thought for a moment. He needed Kid to get it together. He needed the thief to tell him what he knew, but that wasn't going to happen with the phantom in this condition.

"Your English has improved dramatically since the last time I heard you use it," he remarked off-handedly, catching Kaito by surprise. "You sound really natural. Sort of British, but…"

"Thanks. I've had private lessons." Kaito smiled softly at the memories of England and Saguru's family.

"You have an excellent tutor, then," Conan continued, trying to draw Kaito's attention away from present events, get him to calm down.

"Her Grace, Charlotte Griffin, 12th Baroness FitzHerbert of Eastwell _and_ the world-renown fashion mogul Helen Griffin; two of the best, I'd say," Kaito chuckled proudly.

Conan's jaw came crashing to the hideous brown/orange/yellow/green (puke-colored) carpet. "You're messing with me, aren't you?"

Kaito shook his head. "Haku-chan's been taking me to England with him on weekends and holidays, so I learn from his gran and his mum respectively."

The look of incredulity on Conan's face morphed slightly into exasperated suspicion. "He takes you home to visit his family?"

Kaito nodded, thinking nothing of it.

"…Are you two…? _You know_…?" The thought of his colleague shacking up with the thief they were chasing made Conan's hair stand on end.

"We're in love!" Kaito teased, giggling.

Conan tried to contain a whole-body-shiver, but he was not successful.

And Kaito laughed some more. "No. But seriously. We're close, but…he's my long-lost brother. Nothing kinky. You have such a dirty mind, Tantei-kun."

Conan's expression soured, but he then realized that his companion was laughing and smiling again, acting more or less normal…as far as Kid went.

Now might be a good time to try again with the questioning…or maybe he'd just send the thief into another panic attack, but…

"Hey," he called softly, getting Kid's attention. "Look, I need you to do something for me."

Kaito cocked his head to the side.

"I want to get you out of here, but I need your help to do that, okay?" Conan cast him a serious look, meeting his eyes. "I'm not going to ask you anything about the victim, okay? So don't even think about that."

Kid's face started to turn blue.

"Stay right here with me, okay?" Conan instructed in a voice that demanded attention and obedience. "Stay here, and focus. I just need you to look over there at the suspects. Over there by the police. See those nine people? Can you tell me, did you see them before in the shop?"

Kaito glanced at them and nodded, recounting how he had passed each one of them, what they had been doing, what they'd been saying.

At parts Conan frowned, focusing on the facts in evidence, sorting through them to see what might be important. After a minute of reflection, when he had cemented the scene before the murder in his mind, he asked, "Do they look any different now than they did then? Has anything changed?"

Kaito took a deep breath before setting about the task at hand. He scanned the suspects: the elderly couple, the gaggle of high school girls, the pair of young women…

And then it occurred to him: "The man in black is missing."

Conan froze as if the air had been knocked out of him. "What did he look like?!"

Kaito jumped at the sudden desperation and ferocity with which his prospective savior was questioning him. "Uh…I…" Kaito tried to call up a mental image, but it was all fuzzy. "I don't know. He was just a creeper. You know. Black shades, upturned collar, black hat. He was probably thirty. Pretty slender but wearing bulky clothes despite the fact that it's the beginning of August. He was debating over which pair of oxfords to buy, but…he didn't look suspicious or anything. He didn't have a weapon on him. He was just your garden variety creeper."

"You're _sure_? How could you tell?" Conan demanded, not ready to let go of this possible link to the Organization yet.

Kaito's expression slowly turned grim. "Believe me. You learn how to tell. It's something I subconsciously check for. He wasn't suspicious, and he didn't have a weapon."

Conan pursed his lips for a minute and then let them go with a pop. "Okay. Anything else?"

Kaito nodded. "Nothing much. I don't think it's significant, but…those two women. The skinny one had a handkerchief hanging out of her bag before. I don't remember the shade exactly, but it was dark. And then the less skinny one was wearing different shoes. They look practically the same, but the ones she was wearing before didn't have bows on them."

Conan's ears seemed to prick up at this, but before Kaito could ask what was up, the schoolyard sleuth was off like a bottle rocket, on the scent.

Twenty minutes later, Conan had led the police by their noses through the investigation without them suspecting a thing…or perhaps they were used to it by now and were merely playing their role without question so long as the murder got solved. The two women were arrested. The shoes and handkerchief had been found in a nearby trashcan, covered in blood.

And apparently Kaito was free to go. Conan had resolutely proclaimed that "Candy" had seen nothing, knew nothing. She wasn't a witness, merely the unlucky girl who had found the body.

And they believed the shrunken sleuth. Despite the fact that Conan had been talking to Candy for nearly fifteen minutes. Conan maintained that Candy had nothing to do with the case. No one questioned Conan. No one tried to question Candy either.

The crowd slowly dispersed, and Kaito was left alone on his little bench, staring unseeing at a wall of shoes that just didn't excite him the way they had an hour ago.

Kaito sat there for a while, drained and without the desire to move. He wished for the ability to teleport. He just wanted to go home and curl up in his bed. Shadows of the past were still flickering at the edges of his mind, and he wanted to go home and drug himself to sleep to make it all go away, keep himself from the bad dreams that were sure to plague him for this and many of the following nights to come.

A jacket hit him in the face.

Kaito blinked, jerking back to life at the assault.

Tantei-kun was standing in front of him looking…tsundere.

"I bought you a jacket. Put it on," he commanded, looking away and blushing as if now that the case was over, for the first time he was realizing and taking into account what Kaito was wearing... More his lack of coverage than anything.

"Does my sex appeal bother you, Tantei-kun?" Kaito laughed, causing the detective to bristle like a cat faced with the bathtub.

"What s-sex appeal?" Conan stumbled over the word in his embarrassment, pointedly not looking at Kaito's overflowing bosom or plainly visible thong. "You're dressed like a prostitute. Don't you have any self-respect? I mean, do you really want guys ogling you like a piece of meat? You don't have to walk around half naked to get people to look at you and think you're attractive. If it's attention you want, you're asking for the wrong kind, and I know you can take care of yourself, but bad things happen to young women who walk around alone dressed like that. You're inviting trouble, whether it's just punks harassing you, gropers on trains, or even rapists." Conan stuck his hands in his pockets, still looking off to the side as he lectured. "If you want attention, cover up a little and save something for the imagination. Inner beauty is more attractive than your slutty outfit, so…put that jacket on already."

Kaito stared solemnly at his rival, taking in the words—the admonishment along with the concern. "Inner beauty, huh?" he mumbled, looking down at the jacket in his lap before deciding to put it on.

He held his tongue as the thought, _"…But I'm ugly on the inside"_ came to mind.

"Come on." Once again, Conan's voice pulled him from his morose thoughts. "You look like hell. There's a café about six shops down and around the corner. For today only I won't arrest you, and I'll buy you…a hot chocolate…and a pastry. Whatever you want, so come on." Conan turned and began to walk away, leaving Kaito without a lot of time to determine what he wanted to do.

Thoughts of "Why are you being so nice to me? This is about my mental breakdown earlier, isn't it? You're just doing this out of pity, aren't you?" and "Kuroba, you shouldn't let your guard down around your rival. He could change his mind and have you arrested in a second. You're in danger. Why do you trust him so much? You're a fool, Kuroba." flooded Kaito's mind, but he pushed them aside. He didn't have the energy for sorting through that mess at the moment.

Instead, he stood up to follow because he knew that he could really use that cup of hot chocolate and a sympathetic ear. He wasn't ready to go home and be alone yet, and it looked like Tantei-kun was feeling merciful today. Kaito decided to take advantage of his…friendly rival's charitable mood.

…

Mikau: Yay! I'm actually pretty happy with this now that I've gone back and edited it. I didn't actually change much, but somehow just getting all of the little kinks out of it makes me a lot happier with it. Next I believe we're going to have a little coffee date scene between Kaito and Conan, and then a brief bro-ship moment between Hakuba and Kaito. And then a heist! So that Kaito can get shot and Conan can realize "Oh my gosh! He's fighting the Organization too!" so that Kaito can be introduced to the FBI so that Kaito and Conan can start going on missions together. I'm, like, super excited to write the missions where they infiltrate and gather information and steal stuff from the Org. I think this is super ambitious, though, and I'm worried about failing miserably, but I want to try, so I'll do my best. I'll be counting on your support as usual. Thanks in advance everyone!


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